Top 114 Espionage Quotes & Sayings

Spy' is such a short ugly word. I prefer 'espionage.' Those extra three syllables really say something.

I cannot think that espionage can be recommended as a technique for building an impressive civilization. It's a lout's game.

You couldn't trust anyone or anything that belonged to the world of espionage.

But I made him the Deputy Secretary for Homeland Security because that added an element of political espionage.

We have some material on spying by a major government on the tech industry. Industrial espionage.

In most espionage novels, the characters risk their lives trying to save somebody or while protecting a nation from some threat. In 'The Travelers,' that's not what's going on. I used espionage as a device to heighten the characters' personal dramas.

Generally speaking, espionage offers each spy an opportunity to go crazy in a way he finds irresistible.

I'm sort of fascinated by the whole espionage crime thing.

What was once a comparatively minor threat - people hacking for fun or for bragging rights - has turned into full-blown economic espionage and extremely lucrative cyber crime.

The Internet has made us richer, freer, connected and informed in ways its founders could not have dreamt of. It has also become a vector of attack, espionage, crime and harm.

I grew up reading the classic novels of Cold War espionage, and I studied Russian history and Soviet foreign policy.

All women are natural born espionage agents.

Both cyber and old-fashioned human-intelligence industrial espionage has occurred for decades without any significant retribution by the United States.

When I accepted the commission, I had something of an epiphany in the research I did about the agency, actually the science of espionage. I realized there is a connection between the sciences and the invisible forces of man.

Out of every 10 scripts I get sent, seven are fairly generic about an American guy who gets the girl and is involved in underground espionage activity.

This is the wonderful thing about espionage, nothing exists any more.

I've always had a great affection for espionage stories. I like weaving them, and I like thrillers.

That world of spies and espionage, there's a coldness to it. That's what makes those worlds fascinating - and what makes le Carre's work so interesting.

It is ironic that Samuel Berger learned of this espionage in exactly the same month that Al Gore was attending his now famous fund-raiser with Buddhist nuns in Southern California.

Who would have thought that in the 1950s, Burbank was a hotbed of international espionage?

Once you've lived the inside-out world of espionage, you never shed it. It's a mentality, a double standard of existence.

In the case of Pakistan, the CIA actually used a fake vaccination campaign to try to locate Osama bin Laden, so now vaccination is associated with espionage.

There is no place where espionage is not possible.

My understanding is that espionage means giving secret or classified information to the enemy. Since Snowden shared information with the American people, his indictment for espionage could reveal (or confirm) that the US Government views you and me as the enemy.

We need to make sure that whenever we're engaging in a cyber-warfare campaign, a cyber-espionage campaign in the United States, that we understand the word cyber is used as a euphemism for the internet, because the American public would not be excited to hear that we're doing internet warfare campaigns, internet espionage campaigns, because we realize that we ourselves are impacted by it.

Organizations, whether they are nonprofits or enterprise, need to be aware that nation-states are coming after them for political espionage, economic espionage, or destructive attacks.

The only reason that there has been no sabotage or espionage on the part of Japanese-Americans is that they are waiting for the right moment to strike.

Espionage and counterespionage go together like horse and carriage.

To charge Snowden with espionage is a severe form of political persecution.

The sort of sweeping parochial espionage and attempts to extract information from all sorts of institutions are well documented, but I think in this context there's a danger of oversimplifying and seeing that sector of cyber as a one-way street.

There are serious and legitimate concerns about academic espionage at our universities.

All the governments just want to have more power when it comes to economic espionage, diplomatic manipulation and political influence.

The Obama administration has attempted to prosecute more journalists and journalistic sources under the same Espionage Act she was being investigated under in all previous presidencies combined.

All warfare is based on deception. There is no place where espionage is not used. Offer the enemy bait to lure him.

Kink isn't a crime; conspiring with a foreign power to commit espionage, fix election is. Stay focused.

I was asked by a journalist to sum up the story in a minute, and I was like, 'No.' It goes from Trump to Brexit to Russian espionage to military operations in Afghanistan to hacking the president of Nigeria. Where do you even begin?

Xi agreed to the American definition of legitimate espionage. In other words, you don't use the power of the state to steal secrets for profit.

An espionage organization is a collector: it collects raw information. That gets processed by a machinery that is supposed to resolve its reliability, and to present a finished product.

In civilizations without boats, dreams dry up, espionage takes the place of adventure and the police take the place of pirates.

It is getting to the point where the mark of international distinction and service to humanity is no longer the Nobel Peace Price, but an espionage indictment from the US Department of Justice.

Deception is a sort of seduction. In love and war, adultery and espionage, deceit can only succeed if the deceived party is willing, in some way, to be deceived.

Advanced nation-states are now using cyber power for unrestricted economic warfare and national security-motivated espionage, as well as a force multiplier and signaling instrument in conflicts.

The Espionage Act is very broadly written. It doesn't make distinguish - or it doesn't make distinctions between categories of people that can receive and publish information and under what circumstances.

When you think of the Cold War, there are various places where you imagine espionage. Espionage crossroads of the Cold War bring you to the backstreets of Berlin, or Vienna.

In terms of the espionage, this is something I have talked to President Obama about. We don't want it to mar the relationship between Mexico and the United States. But it is unacceptable for a country to practice such espionage, especially if there is a good relationship with the other country.

Cuba continues to be a source of instability in the region. For example, historic numbers of people are fleeing the island of Cuba, putting migratory pressure on the United States. Number two, this Cuban government is anti-American. They sponsor - they allow the Chinese and the Russians to conduct espionage, electronic espionage and others from the island of Cuba.

The human spy, in terms of the American espionage effort, had never been terribly pertinent.

Mainly, when I go see a show, unfortunately it's more industrial espionage than it is going to actually enjoy a show.

Cyber attacks are not what makes the cool war cool. As a strategic matter, they do not differ fundamentally from older tools of espionage and sabotage.

Cyber espionage is very lucrative for economic benefit to a nation.

Cyber attacks are not what makes the cool war 'cool.' As a strategic matter, they do not differ fundamentally from older tools of espionage and sabotage.

Maha Kumbh' blends elements from Hindu mythology with the international espionage thriller. Nothing like it has ever been attempted on Indian television.

Look realistically at espionage thrillers again. They're not only alive, readers are excited about them.

My name is E. Howard Hunt. I'm currently retired from more than 22 years in the profession of espionage.

I am a huge fan of Alan Furst. Furst is the best in the business--the most talented espionage novelist of our generation.

Broadly speaking, the problems with the Espionage Act are that it is hopelessly broad. And we tend to use the Espionage Act - we think about the Espionage Act as forbidding disclosures of classified information. That's not really what the statute says. What the statute talks about is information related to the national defense.

Indeed, the U.N. is the main Soviet espionage center in this country.

If we are going to conduct espionage in the future, we are going to have to make some changes in the relationship between the intelligence community and the public it serves.

When you're dealing with espionage and covert affairs, sometimes the secret is more exciting than the knowledge.

[My novels] introduce levels of intelligence ... moral doubt [and] self-doubt, which may not pertain [to real-world espionage].